RS

MEMBER DIARY

Ohio Gov Says No to Unions

Sorry netroots, more centrism for you

It seems Ohio’s economy is bad enough that even Democrats have to draw the line. The Obama supporting union SEIU has been pushing a ballot initiative which would require every business with 25 or more employees to offer seven sick days to full-time employees. Realizing that the last thing a struggling economy needs is more mandates, and the last thing he needs is to be blamed for more job losses, Governor Strickland has been trying to work out some compromise that might lesson the blow to business.

Gov. Ted Strickland and Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher said they will not back the sick days mandate that has been pushed to the November ballot by one of their major union supporters, the SEIU.

“We cannot support the paid sick-day ballot initiative,” they said in a joint statement. “While we would hope that all Ohio businesses would make paid sick days available to their employees whenever possible, we believe that this initiative is unworkable, unwieldy and would be detrimental to Ohio’s economy, and we will be opposing it and asking Ohioans to oppose it as a result.”

This highlights the problem the Democrats are facing across the country. Many of the Democrats that are getting elected are doing so as centrists and even conservative on social issues. This is not the power of the netroots but the failure of the GOP.

Seats that used to be held by moderate to conservative Republicans are now being won by moderate to conservative Democrats. Is this a shift to the left? Sure, but not a large one. Witness Strickland.

Has he remained popular by lurching to the left and attempting to push through the lefty wish list? No, he has remained popular by being competent, working with the GOP General Assembly, and not antagonizing business.

Think about that for a moment. In a choice between business and labor a Democratic governor just chose business.

Notice to the angry online left: start raising money to challenge Governor Strickland in a primary. After all, he is clearly another Democrat in the pockets of big business and you demand ideological purity, right?